September 29, 2020 • 10 mins
Rudolf Diesel disappeared on this day in 1913, which is also marked as the date of his death. / On this day in 1957, an explosion in a Soviet plutonium-processing plant created fallout that contaminated thousands of square miles around the disaster site.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, y'all, were rerunning two episodes today, which means that
you'll hear two hosts me and Tracy V. Wilson. Enjoy
the show. Welcome to this Day in History Class from
how Stuff Works dot Com and from the desk of
Stuff You Missed in History Class. It's the show where
we explore the past, one day at a time with
a quick look at what happened today in history. Hello,
(00:23):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson and Et.
September twenty nine. Rudolph Diesel disappeared on this day in
nineteen thirteen, which is also generally marked as the day
of his death. Of course, Rudolph Diesel is best known
as an engineer, the inventor of the Diesel engine. He
was born in Paris to German parents on March eighteenth
of eighteen fifty eight, and he lived in France until
(00:45):
the family was deported in eighteen seventy due to the
Franco German War. Although the family was deported to England,
Diesel was sent to his father's hometown of Augsburg, Germany.
He showed an enormous aptitude for engineering, as un as
he enrolled in school there and he decided to be
an engineer at the age of fourteen. As he continued
(01:06):
his studies, he was really captivated by lectures he attended
that were given by Carl von Linden. These were on thermodynamics,
and what he became really focused on was trying to
replace the steam engine, which was incredibly inefficient. It takes
a lot of energy to make the steam required to
run a steam engine. About of the energy used in
(01:29):
a steam engine is just wasted, and at this point, trains,
ships and factories were pretty much all running on steam.
People were mostly traveling by horse. There also were some
internal combustion engines in use, but they also were very inefficient.
So Diesel was working on an engine that would inject
(01:51):
fuel into the engines combustion chamber, where the air inside
of it was compressed to the point that it was
very hot. That would cause the fuel to spontaneously ignited.
So this engine worked without an ignition system and without
spark plugs. Today we associate diesel engines with diesel fuel,
but Rudolph Diesel was designing them to run on vegetable
(02:13):
or peanut oil. His first engine was more than twice
as efficient as a steam engine, and he got a
patent for it in eighteen ninety two. But he kept
on improving his design, trying to make it more and
more efficient, and at first his his inventions seemed to
be catching on. He was making a fair amount of money.
By nineteen twelve, there were tens of thousands of diesel
(02:36):
engines and use, especially in factories, most of them replacing
steam engines. But these early models of the diesel engine
had some problems. It was true they were a lot
more efficient than what they were replacing, but they often
weren't as reliable as what they were replacing, so dissatisfied
customers demanded their money back. On September twenty nine nine,
(03:00):
Rudolph Diesel was traveling from Antwerp, Belgium, to Harwick, England,
on the steamship Dresden. He was headed there to meet
with the British Navy about the idea of using diesel
engines and submarines, and that night he disappeared from the deck.
In the morning, his bed was found not to have
been slept in. Then, on October a sailor spotted a
(03:22):
body in the water that turned out to be diesels.
There is a lot of mystery still surrounding this conspiracy
theories started circulating all over the place at the time,
connected to everything from the oncoming First World War to
just in general, the British wanting to not have to
pay licensing fees on his invention. It was officially ruled
(03:47):
that he had taken his own life, but many people
believed and still believed, that he was murdered. The diesel
engine continued to be incredibly influential in the years after
Diesel's death. Though it was used in railroads, and especially
in the years after World War Two, it became standard
in trucks and busses. The diesel engines high efficiency made
(04:08):
it a lot more economical for hauling really heavy loads
of cargo or passengers than the other options available at
the time, and of course today there are cars with
diesel engines, including those that run on bio diesel. Although
diesel automobile engines hadn't been developed yet during Rudolph Diesel's lifetime,
he was working on much larger engines for much larger uses.
(04:30):
Thanks to Christopher Hasciotis for his research work on today's episode,
Antatari Harrison for all her audio work on this podcast,
you can Subscribe to This Day in History Class on
Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and where Rails to get your podcasts.
Tune in tomorrow for a colossal aircraft. Hey I'm Eves
(04:57):
and welcome to This Day in History Class, a show
that uncovers history one day at a time. The day
was September twenty nine, nineteen fifty seven. A waste tank
(05:17):
exploded at Mayak plutonium processing plant in the Soviet Union.
The explosion led to the contamination of nearby towns, but
the Soviet government resorted to covering up the Kistum disaster.
As it's now known, people in the area are still
suffering from the effects of the nuclear contamination. In nineteen
(05:39):
fifty seven, during the Cold War, the Soviet Union was
embroiled in a nuclear arms race with the United States.
The Kistum Nuclear Energy Complex, then known as Cheliabinsk forty,
was located in the Ural mountains, several miles east of
the city of Kaistum. The nuclear reactors and plutonium processing
plant were built at the complex in the nineteen forties
(06:02):
for the development of nuclear weapons. The city built to
house the workers was called julia Binsk. The secret nuclear
facility is now called Mayak and the surrounding city is
known as Ozyorsk. There was such a push to develop
nuclear weapons that safety and research on the effects of
radioactivity on people and the environment was not a priority.
(06:25):
Even before the nineteen fifty seven disaster, Mayak was the
source of many hazards and accidents. Workers did not wear
much protective gear. Nuclear reactors dumped radioactive waste right into
the Taka River. Villagers who used the contaminated water faced radiation,
poisoning and other illnesses. Though there have been many accidents
(06:48):
at the plant since it opened, the one it's infamous
for happened on September ninety seven. Cooling systems surrounded the
buried tanks that contained liquid reactor way East, but one
of the cooling systems had been malfunctioning. The waist grew
so hot from atomic decay that the system failed. The
(07:09):
tank's cooling liquid evaporated, and the seventy eight tons of
radioactive waste inside the tank combusted. The lid burst, and
the explosion created an aerosol plume of radioactive fallout that
was spread over about eight thousand square miles or twenty
square kilometers, though around two hundred and seventy thousand people
(07:30):
lived in that area, only eleven thousand people were evacuated,
and evacuations were slow and left many people behind. The
Soviet government did not tell evacuees what happened, and the
people who remained in the area were exposed to radiation
as they were tasked with destroying crops and livestock. In fact,
(07:51):
the Soviets kept the cause of the disaster a secret,
even as radiation sickness sent many people to the hospital
and people began dying. The Western press did receive reports
that there had been a nuclear accident in the Soviet Union,
but those reports were a little more than rumor until
the dissident Soviet biologists zures A met Bedif, reported on
(08:12):
the disaster in the journal News Scientists in nineteen seventy six.
The Soviet government continued to deny the occurrence of the
disaster until it began declassifying relevant documents in nineteen eighty nine.
It's been positive that the U. S c i A.
Knew about the disaster for years before it was uncovered,
but kept it a secret and later downplayed the severity
(08:35):
of the accident to avoid selling doubt about the safety
of American nuclear plants. The Kashtum disaster was rated at
a level six as a serious accident on the International
Nuclear and Radiological Events Scale, making it the third most
severe nuclear accident ever. The two above it major accidents
(08:56):
rated as level sevens on the scale are the disasters
at Fuka Shima and Chernobyl. The reason the disaster is
remembered as the cash Um disaster, even though it didn't
take place there, is because people were told that a
coal boiler explosion in the city caused a mess that
residents were made to clean up with no protective gear.
(09:16):
Russia has claimed that the plant stopped dumping its waste
into the Taka River, though some people have questioned whether
the dumps ever really stopped. Some villagers who lived along
the river were relocated, but many still live in their
contaminated villages. Cancer, birth defects, miscarriages, and other health issues
(09:36):
occur at higher rates in places along the river. The
Mayak plant is still in operation, but it no longer
processes weapons great plutonium. It now reprocesses spent nuclear fuel.
I'm eve Chef Coote, and hopefully you know a little
more about history today than you did yesterday. If there's
(09:57):
something that I missed in an episode, you can share
with everybody else on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook at t
D i h C podcast. Thanks for joining me on
this trip through time. See you here in the exact
same spot tomorrow. For more podcasts from I Heart Radio,
(10:29):
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
Hey, y'all, were rerunning two episodes today, which means that
you'll hear two hosts me and Tracy V. Wilson. Enjoy
the show. Welcome to this Day in History Class from
how Stuff Works dot Com and from the desk of
Stuff You Missed in History Class. It's the show where
we explore the past, one day at a time with
a quick look at what happened today in history. Hello,
(00:23):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson and Et.
September twenty nine. Rudolph Diesel disappeared on this day in
nineteen thirteen, which is also generally marked as the day
of his death. Of course, Rudolph Diesel is best known
as an engineer, the inventor of the Diesel engine. He
was born in Paris to German parents on March eighteenth
of eighteen fifty eight, and he lived in France until
(00:45):
the family was deported in eighteen seventy due to the
Franco German War. Although the family was deported to England,
Diesel was sent to his father's hometown of Augsburg, Germany.
He showed an enormous aptitude for engineering, as un as
he enrolled in school there and he decided to be
an engineer at the age of fourteen. As he continued
(01:06):
his studies, he was really captivated by lectures he attended
that were given by Carl von Linden. These were on thermodynamics,
and what he became really focused on was trying to
replace the steam engine, which was incredibly inefficient. It takes
a lot of energy to make the steam required to
run a steam engine. About of the energy used in
(01:29):
a steam engine is just wasted, and at this point, trains,
ships and factories were pretty much all running on steam.
People were mostly traveling by horse. There also were some
internal combustion engines in use, but they also were very inefficient.
So Diesel was working on an engine that would inject
(01:51):
fuel into the engines combustion chamber, where the air inside
of it was compressed to the point that it was
very hot. That would cause the fuel to spontaneously ignited.
So this engine worked without an ignition system and without
spark plugs. Today we associate diesel engines with diesel fuel,
but Rudolph Diesel was designing them to run on vegetable
(02:13):
or peanut oil. His first engine was more than twice
as efficient as a steam engine, and he got a
patent for it in eighteen ninety two. But he kept
on improving his design, trying to make it more and
more efficient, and at first his his inventions seemed to
be catching on. He was making a fair amount of money.
By nineteen twelve, there were tens of thousands of diesel
(02:36):
engines and use, especially in factories, most of them replacing
steam engines. But these early models of the diesel engine
had some problems. It was true they were a lot
more efficient than what they were replacing, but they often
weren't as reliable as what they were replacing, so dissatisfied
customers demanded their money back. On September twenty nine nine,
(03:00):
Rudolph Diesel was traveling from Antwerp, Belgium, to Harwick, England,
on the steamship Dresden. He was headed there to meet
with the British Navy about the idea of using diesel
engines and submarines, and that night he disappeared from the deck.
In the morning, his bed was found not to have
been slept in. Then, on October a sailor spotted a
(03:22):
body in the water that turned out to be diesels.
There is a lot of mystery still surrounding this conspiracy
theories started circulating all over the place at the time,
connected to everything from the oncoming First World War to
just in general, the British wanting to not have to
pay licensing fees on his invention. It was officially ruled
(03:47):
that he had taken his own life, but many people
believed and still believed, that he was murdered. The diesel
engine continued to be incredibly influential in the years after
Diesel's death. Though it was used in railroads, and especially
in the years after World War Two, it became standard
in trucks and busses. The diesel engines high efficiency made
(04:08):
it a lot more economical for hauling really heavy loads
of cargo or passengers than the other options available at
the time, and of course today there are cars with
diesel engines, including those that run on bio diesel. Although
diesel automobile engines hadn't been developed yet during Rudolph Diesel's lifetime,
he was working on much larger engines for much larger uses.
(04:30):
Thanks to Christopher Hasciotis for his research work on today's episode,
Antatari Harrison for all her audio work on this podcast,
you can Subscribe to This Day in History Class on
Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and where Rails to get your podcasts.
Tune in tomorrow for a colossal aircraft. Hey I'm Eves
(04:57):
and welcome to This Day in History Class, a show
that uncovers history one day at a time. The day
was September twenty nine, nineteen fifty seven. A waste tank
(05:17):
exploded at Mayak plutonium processing plant in the Soviet Union.
The explosion led to the contamination of nearby towns, but
the Soviet government resorted to covering up the Kistum disaster.
As it's now known, people in the area are still
suffering from the effects of the nuclear contamination. In nineteen
(05:39):
fifty seven, during the Cold War, the Soviet Union was
embroiled in a nuclear arms race with the United States.
The Kistum Nuclear Energy Complex, then known as Cheliabinsk forty,
was located in the Ural mountains, several miles east of
the city of Kaistum. The nuclear reactors and plutonium processing
plant were built at the complex in the nineteen forties
(06:02):
for the development of nuclear weapons. The city built to
house the workers was called julia Binsk. The secret nuclear
facility is now called Mayak and the surrounding city is
known as Ozyorsk. There was such a push to develop
nuclear weapons that safety and research on the effects of
radioactivity on people and the environment was not a priority.
(06:25):
Even before the nineteen fifty seven disaster, Mayak was the
source of many hazards and accidents. Workers did not wear
much protective gear. Nuclear reactors dumped radioactive waste right into
the Taka River. Villagers who used the contaminated water faced radiation,
poisoning and other illnesses. Though there have been many accidents
(06:48):
at the plant since it opened, the one it's infamous
for happened on September ninety seven. Cooling systems surrounded the
buried tanks that contained liquid reactor way East, but one
of the cooling systems had been malfunctioning. The waist grew
so hot from atomic decay that the system failed. The
(07:09):
tank's cooling liquid evaporated, and the seventy eight tons of
radioactive waste inside the tank combusted. The lid burst, and
the explosion created an aerosol plume of radioactive fallout that
was spread over about eight thousand square miles or twenty
square kilometers, though around two hundred and seventy thousand people
(07:30):
lived in that area, only eleven thousand people were evacuated,
and evacuations were slow and left many people behind. The
Soviet government did not tell evacuees what happened, and the
people who remained in the area were exposed to radiation
as they were tasked with destroying crops and livestock. In fact,
(07:51):
the Soviets kept the cause of the disaster a secret,
even as radiation sickness sent many people to the hospital
and people began dying. The Western press did receive reports
that there had been a nuclear accident in the Soviet Union,
but those reports were a little more than rumor until
the dissident Soviet biologists zures A met Bedif, reported on
(08:12):
the disaster in the journal News Scientists in nineteen seventy six.
The Soviet government continued to deny the occurrence of the
disaster until it began declassifying relevant documents in nineteen eighty nine.
It's been positive that the U. S c i A.
Knew about the disaster for years before it was uncovered,
but kept it a secret and later downplayed the severity
(08:35):
of the accident to avoid selling doubt about the safety
of American nuclear plants. The Kashtum disaster was rated at
a level six as a serious accident on the International
Nuclear and Radiological Events Scale, making it the third most
severe nuclear accident ever. The two above it major accidents
(08:56):
rated as level sevens on the scale are the disasters
at Fuka Shima and Chernobyl. The reason the disaster is
remembered as the cash Um disaster, even though it didn't
take place there, is because people were told that a
coal boiler explosion in the city caused a mess that
residents were made to clean up with no protective gear.
(09:16):
Russia has claimed that the plant stopped dumping its waste
into the Taka River, though some people have questioned whether
the dumps ever really stopped. Some villagers who lived along
the river were relocated, but many still live in their
contaminated villages. Cancer, birth defects, miscarriages, and other health issues
(09:36):
occur at higher rates in places along the river. The
Mayak plant is still in operation, but it no longer
processes weapons great plutonium. It now reprocesses spent nuclear fuel.
I'm eve Chef Coote, and hopefully you know a little
more about history today than you did yesterday. If there's
(09:57):
something that I missed in an episode, you can share
with everybody else on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook at t
D i h C podcast. Thanks for joining me on
this trip through time. See you here in the exact
same spot tomorrow. For more podcasts from I Heart Radio,
(10:29):
visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.
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